Golden Grove inmate charged in stabbing faces 20 more years

ST. CROIX - N'Kosi Parris is currently being detained at Golden Grove Correctional Facility as two separate murder charges and another assault hang over his head. Wednesday, he appeared before Magistrate Miguel Camacho, this time charged with stabbing a fellow detainee during an altercation Tuesday morning.

Parris was charged with third-degree assault, promoting dangerous prison contraband and disturbance of the peace in connection to the stabbing incident reported to police just after 10:30 a.m. Tuesday.

He was advised that if he is tried and convicted on the charges against him he could spend an additional 20 years in prison in even in the unlikely event that the he does not spend the rest of his life in prison in connection to the two murder charges.

Tuesday morning's assault was the second stabbing at the prison in three days.

According to the probable cause fact sheet filed in Superior Court by V.I. Police Detective Cureene Smith, a corrections officers reported to police that he was near one of the units in the prison when he saw detainee Jermaine Ducreay walk onto the basketball court. He said not too long after he also saw Parris walk onto the basket ball court.

Smith said the officer reported that he looked away for a moment and when he looked up again, he saw that the two detainees were fighting and had locked on to each other and that Parris had a knife in his hands. He told police that by the time he got the gate open, Parris had already been able to stab Ducreay and still had the knife in hand.

The corrections officer told police that he called for back up then wrestled the knife away from Parris and detained him until assistance came. Parris was arrested then transported to the Police Administrative Building where he was booked.

Smith said Parris declined making a statement to police.

Ducreay was initially treated by medical staff at the prison, then taken to Luis Hospital where he was treated for three non-life threatening wounds to his back and subsequently released. Ducreay is detained awaiting trial in a case where he is charged with firing shots at a police detective in Mutual Homes housing community last year.

Bail for Parris was set at $25,000 and Camacho said he would request that the entire bail amount be posted and he present the court with a third-party custodian in order for his release to be considered in the event that the other two cases against him are disposed of in his favor without additional incarceration.

Parris is currently being held on second-degree murder, second-degree aggravated rape, aggravated child abuse, child exploitation and possession of a dangerous weapon during the commission of a crime of violence in connection with the Jan. 25, 2011, beating and murder of 16-year-old Jamal Richardson.

According to police, Richardson's body had signs of obvious trauma when he was found dead in an under-construction Frederiksted church, but they would give no further details and the affidavit filed in court is under seal.

When Parris was arrested in connection to the teens death, he already was in the custody of the Corrections Bureau at Golden Grove in connection with a killing that took place just two months after Richardson's death.

Hours after a March 31, 2011, shooting at Two Brother's Meat Market in Frederiksted, police arrested Parris and Mario Daniels Jr., 20, of Marley housing community. Both men have been charged with first-degree murder, first-degree robbery, first-degree assault, possession of an unlicensed firearm and using a dangerous weapon during a violent crime in the Two Brother's Meat Market slaying.

Police said the two men and a third person, went to the market to carry out an armed robbery and Parris was the one who shot and killed store owner Munif Awawda, 33, who was sitting behind his counter. A second man, who came in during the robbery, was shot and seriously wounded.

The cases were severed and Daniel has since gone to trial and was convicted by a jury of first-degree murder while the two murder cases against Parris are still pending and he is held on $2.5 million bail

Parris has also been charged with aggravated assault and battery stemming from an incident reported Feb. 7, 2013 in which authorities said he punched a Corrections officer in the mouth with his closed fist, causing injuries.

The incident where Parris is accused of stabbing Ducreay on Tuesday was the second stabbing at the prison in three days.

Inmate Owen Browne had been upgraded to stable condition at Luis Hospital on Wednesday after being critically wounded during a stabbing at the prison Saturday.

Prison officials said Browne suffered lacerations to the abdomen that required immediate surgery and was in critical condition this weekend.

The V.I. Corrections Bureau identified inmate Jamal Fahie as a suspect in that stabbing, but as of Wednesday afternoon he had not been charged in the incident as prison officials say the investigation is still ongoing.

Fahie, who is serving a life sentence for first-degree murder for a November 2011 shooting on Bunker Hill on St. Thomas, has stabbed a fellow inmate before. In February 2013, he accepted a plea deal that consolidated several pending cases, including the inmate stabbing.

Browne is serving a five-year sentence for involuntary manslaughter, stemming from a 2012 vehicular homicide on Midland Road. According to police, Christian Soto Jr., 40, was intoxicated and lying in the street on Feb. 15, 2012, when he was hit and killed by a motorist, who later was identified as Browne. They say brown dragged the mans body for more than 25 feet and never stopped to render assistance. He has served almost half of his sentence.

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